Geneva Motor Show

Volvo’s performance arm Polestar has announced that it is taking deposits for its first full production model, the rather lovely Polestar 1. For a sum totalling €2,500 or $2,500 or 20,000RMB, you can secure your place in the queue to purchase the company’s first ever hybrid GT car. That deposit is fully refundable should you change your mind, though you might be swayed by some numbers. The Polestar 1 features a 2.0-litre four-cylinder petrol engine up front, and a pair of electric motors. In total, that equates to 591bhp, 782lb ft of torque and a 0-62mph time somewhere in the threes. Probably. Polestar also promises a range of 93 miles on a single charge, in pure EV mode (and, thus, rear-drive only mode). It gets: big brakes, adaptive Ohlins suspension, significant use of carbon fibre around the body, and the same platform architecture that underpins the Volvo S90 (albeit trimmed front and back a bit). Just 500 will be built, and … [Read more...] about You can now order a 591bhp Polestar 1

Máté Petrány / Road&Track Having discussed the future with Christian von Koenigsegg at the Geneva Motor Show, I was also keen to find out what sort of a tie Horacio Pagani picked for the occasion, not to mention his thoughts on electric mobility. Advertisement - Continue Reading Below Luckily, he had a lot to say, purely in Italian, of course.Allora...Up until 2025, including in America, we’ll be able to use the new bi-turbo engine we are going to introduce next year. It's a combustion engine with no electric aid. Since eight months ago, we also have a new team looking into the possibility of an electric car. It will not just be a replacement of our engine (with an electric motor). We are working on a totally new concept for this electric car. We are studying it, but of course we don’t know yet whether in five or six years time, our customers will be ready to spend this much money on an electric car of our concept. Usually, our customers … [Read more...] about Here’s What Horacio Pagani Thinks of Electric Cars

Máté Petrány / Road&Track Porsche's first modern electric car, the Mission E, is coming soon, and if the feedback is positive, it will be closely followed by the Cross Turismo variant. Both are pretty much production-ready as we speak, based on Porsche's self-developed J1 platform. And there's a lot more coming, as we learned from Dr. Stefan Weckbach, head of Porsche's EV line. Advertisement - Continue Reading Below The VW Group's universal EV platform is called PPE. It's a mix of their best available modules, upgraded with new elements such as permanent magnet motors and an 800V electrical system, developed partly through the Porsche 919 endurance racing program. Yet long before work could begin on the PPE, Porsche came up with its own EV platform, the J1.The upcoming Mission E is based on this in-house development, which could go on to underpin a number of future products, including two-door, 2+2 and convertible models. The only limitation is that, although … [Read more...] about Porsche Knows its Electric Cars Have to Perform Like They Burn Gasoline

Máté Petrány / Road&Track So far this March, we have established that the man behind the world's fastest car, Christian von Koenigsegg, loves Adrian Newey's Aston Martin Valkyrie, and also thinks that Volvo's design team is beating the Germans at every angle. He is particularly fond of the Polestar 1 hybrid coupé.Perhaps more importantly, Koenigsegg's headcount has also gone up to 165, and the company is looking to hire another 60 people in the coming months, at a rate of one per week. This is all so that they can establish a one car per week cycle, which is an ambitious goal considering that Christian would be happy if they ended 2018 with 28 cars finished, despite an initial target of 38. Advertisement - Continue Reading Below Máté Petrány / Road&Track The company will double its production floor by relocating some WW2 warplanes from an old hangar next door, but in the meantime, Koenigsegg will also finalize the replacement of the … [Read more...] about Here’s How Koenigsegg Sees the Future

The Lexus LC drives as good as it looks, which is to say that it drives really well. In fact, it's probably our favorite Lexus since the LFA, which in case you forgot, cost nearly four times as much when new. Now, Lexus wants all of its cars to have some of the dynamic flavor of the LC, and yes, that includes the new baby UX crossover it showed at Geneva. Advertisement - Continue Reading Below At the show, we caught up with Chika Kako, Lexus's first female chief engineer and the woman who led development of the UX, who revealed the interesting links between Lexus' baby crossover and its flagship coupe. Frankly, she got us a lot more interested in the UX than we were when we first saw it. "We are trying to have the same feeling in all the Lexus models starting from LC and LS," Kako said through a interpreter. "Even if we have totally different structures, we are always comparing with the LC."Kako used two interesting words to define the driving characteristics Lexus is aiming … [Read more...] about Lexus Wants All Its Cars to Drive Like the LC

Last month, we saw images of a Lamborghini Aventador prototype testing with new aerodynamic components that looked like the active ALA system used on the Huracan Performante. At the Geneva Motor Show, I asked Maurizio Reggiani, Lamborghini's affable chief technical officer, if the Aventador would get ALA, and well, he didn't deny it. Advertisement - Continue Reading Below Of course, Reggiani wouldn't comment specifically on the pictures we saw, but he did say that "the climb of the Aventador is not yet finished." It's easy to forget that the Aventador has been on the market for nearly seven years, which is a long time in the world of performance cars. Despite that Reggiani thinks the platform has more performance to give before a replacement is launched. Just don't expect an Aventador Performante, though."The Peformante name was born for the Huracan," Reggiani said. It seems like SVJ, referencing the old Miura SV Jota, is a more likely name for a hot, future Aventador.While we were … [Read more...] about Lamborghini Might Build an Aventador With Performante-Style Active Aero

The Geneva Motor Show is basically the United Nations General Assembly of ultra-performance cars. The show hosts major players like Ferrari, Lamborghini, Aston Martin and McLaren; boutique producers like Koenigsegg and Pagani; upstarts like Zenvo and Rimac; and even tuners-turned-manufacturers like Texas's own Hennessey. Advertisement - Continue Reading Below But as I strolled the show floor at Geneva this week, one unfamiliar name caught my eye: Corbellati. Don't worry if you've never heard the name before. As it pertains to the automotive world, nearly nobody has. But the out-of-nowhere startup has an outrageously ambitious goal: To build a road car capable of exceeding 500 km/h—in other words, 310 miles per hour."My grandfather was a jeweler, sculptor, painter, he did a lot of stuff with art," Demetrio Corbellati told me at the Geneva Motor Show. "But his job, what fed him, was a jeweler, in Sanremo, Italy."Demetrio's father moved the family out of Italy and to the Canary … [Read more...] about Meet Corbellati, The Latest Startup Trying to Build a 310-MPH Street Car

Máté Petrány / Road&Track BMW launched its N62 V8 in 2002. The 3.6-liter engine came with double overhead camshafts with variable valve lift and timing on both cams. It was also the first engine to use a continuously-variable-length intake manifold. By 2005, the N62 grew to 4.8 liters, producing 362 horsepower. BMW hasn't built one since 2010, and by now, even Morgan's supply of the powerplant has run low. But the last N62-powered British sports cars will certainly make a bang. Advertisement - Continue Reading Below In 2015, when Morgan decided to upgrade its Aero line with a stiffer aluminum chassis and an all new suspension, the company was toying with the idea of a production vehicle inspired by the 2009 Morgan Aero GT3 car. The Aero 8 road car that resulted was a toned-down version of that idea. Now, Morgan feels it's time to bring the full-flavor "gloves off" concept to life.The Aero GT is a limited edition of eight cars, featuring vintage-inspired design … [Read more...] about These Are the Last Morgans With Naturally-Aspirated BMW V8s

Shortly after the GR Supra Racing Concept debuted at the Geneva Motor Show, Toyota brought us to a roundtable to talk to the man behind it, Tetsuya Tada. If Tada-san sounds familiar, it's because he led development of the Toyota 86. And interestingly, he revealed that the 86 and the upcoming Supra have more in common than you might think. At least philosophically. Advertisement - Continue Reading Below "When we launched the [GT]86, the fun-to-drive element and the ease of maneuverability was more important to us than quantifiable figures," Tada-san said through an interpreter. "The element that was lacking was, perhaps, the power, and I've heard about a million questions about 'when we will we be launching the turbo version?'"His answer? "It's not that easy to boost up the engine—if you just increase the horsepower, that creates an unbalanced car, so we have to start from redesigning the platform to accommodate more horsepower."So, when we started the Supra project, we kept this … [Read more...] about The 2019 Toyota Supra Will Sort Of Be the Turbo 86 You’ve Always Wanted

Last year at the Geneva Motor Show, RUF blew minds with its new limited-edition CTR, a carbon-chassis tribute to the original Yellowbird. This year, RUF has the SCR, a new car based on the same carbon chassis, but now with a naturally aspirated flat-six. And don't be fooled—it might look like an old Porsche 911, but it's 100 percent a RUF. Advertisement - Continue Reading Below Seriously—there's no 911 here. RUF even brought the carbon-fiber monocoque it developed in house to prove it. It's a beautiful thing, with a carbon-fiber center tub, and an integrated steel roll-cage. Advertisement - Continue Reading Below Hanging off the back of the chassis is a RUF-designed water-cooled 4.0-liter flat-six that makes 510 hp at 8100 rpm and 347 lb-ft of torque. Freeman Thomas—the legendary Ford designer and 911 hot-rodder now working with RUF in "retirement"—says the engine block is based loosely on Porsche's old "Mezger" flat-six used in the 996 and 997 GT3. It's … [Read more...] about The RUF SCR Is 535 HP of Rear-Engine Carbon-Fiber Goodness